Inspired by true events, this gorgeous, haunting novel intertwines the
lives of two Black female artists more than a century apart, both
outsiders in Italy.
It was the middle of the nineteenth century when Lafanu Brown
audaciously decided to become an artist. In the wake of the American
Civil War, life was especially tough for Black women, but she didn't let
that stop her. The daughter of a Native American woman and an
African-Haitian man, Lafanu had the rare opportunity to study, travel,
and follow her dreams, thanks to her indomitable spirit, but not without
facing intolerance and violence. Now, in 1887, living in Rome as one of
the city's most established painters, she is ready to tell her fiancé
about her difficult life, which began in a poor family forty years
earlier.
In 2019, an Italian art curator of Somali origin is desperately trying
to bring to Europe her younger cousin, who is only sixteen and has
already tried to reach Italy on a long, treacherous journey. While
organizing an art exhibition that will combine the paintings of Lafanu
Brown with the artworks of young migrants, the curator becomes more and
more obsessed with the life and secrets of the nineteenth-century
painter.
Weaving together these two vibrant voices, Igiaba Scego has crafted a
powerful exploration of what it means to be "other," to be a woman, and
particularly a Black woman, in a foreign country, yesterday and today.
